Lockdown Protocol

Lockdown Protocol’s measured performance with the Intel Core Ultra 7 265K and AMD Radeon RX 7700 XT reveals a system that scales predictably across resolutions, but the choice of graphics preset matters more than the resolution itself. The data indicates this pairing is best experienced at Medium or High settings, depending on the target display, with Low serving as a fallback for extreme refresh rates. The 12 GB VRAM and RDNA 3.0 architecture of the RX 7700 XT are sufficient for the game’s demands, while the 20-core CPU provides ample headroom that never appears to bottleneck the GPU in these results.

Settings Recommendations

The benchmark rows show that Ultra is punishing at every resolution, yielding 100.9 FPS at 1080p, 74.3 FPS at 1440p, and 50.8 FPS at 4K. While 100.9 FPS is playable, the drop to 74.3 at 1440p and 50.8 at 4K suggests Ultra is intended for lower resolutions or future hardware. In contrast, High offers a much better balance: 134 FPS at 1080p, 97.6 FPS at 1440p, and 66.6 FPS at 4K. The 1440p High result is particularly notable, as it stays above the 90 FPS threshold many competitive FPS players prefer, while 4K High remains viable for slower-paced play.

Medium, however, is the sweet spot for this combo. It delivers 156.1 FPS at 1080p, 115.1 FPS at 1440p, and 75.1 FPS at 4K. The 4K Medium result is only 8.5 FPS behind 4K High, but the 1440p Medium result is 17.5 FPS ahead of 1440p High. This suggests that Medium removes certain GPU-heavy effects that disproportionately impact higher resolutions, making it the most efficient preset for 1440p and 4K displays. Low remains an option for those chasing maximum refresh rates, hitting 219.4 FPS at 1080p and 161.1 FPS at 1440p, but the visual compromise is substantial.

For a 1080p gamer with a 144Hz monitor, Medium or High both work, with High providing a 14 FPS advantage over Medium at 4K, but the reverse is true at lower resolutions. At 1440p, Medium is the clear recommendation, as it offers 115.1 FPS compared to High’s 97.6 FPS, a 17.9% improvement. At 4K, the choice depends on whether you prefer 75.1 FPS on Medium or 66.6 FPS on High; the data shows Medium is more consistent. Overall, Medium provides the best experience per measured row, with High as a close second for 1080p-only users.

GPU Role

The AMD Radeon RX 7700 XT is built on the Navi 32 chip with RDNA 3.0 architecture, featuring 12 GB of GDDR6 memory on a 192-bit bus. The memory bandwidth is 432.0 GB/s, which is substantial for a mid-range card, and the boost clock reaches 2544 MHz. These specifications directly influence the FPS numbers. The 12 GB VRAM is not exhausted by Lockdown Protocol at any resolution in this dataset, as even the 4K Ultra row (50.8 FPS) does not show signs of memory-related stutters, though min FPS was not recorded.

The GPU’s compute capabilities, 35.17 TFLOPS FP32, drive the high refresh rates seen at 1080p. The 3DMark Steel Nomad DX12 score of 3316 places this GPU in the 73rd percentile of all GPUs, indicating it is above average but not top-tier. Its nearest rival, the NVIDIA GeForce RTX 5060, has an average score of 30109 with a deltaPct of 0, meaning the two are essentially tied in synthetic benchmarks. This parity is reflected in the FPS data, where the RX 7700 XT maintains competitive frame rates without exceeding what its hardware suggests.

The 96 ROPs and 216 TMUs are well-suited for a game like Lockdown Protocol, which appears to be rasterization-heavy. The 2544 MHz boost clock is 17.8% higher than the base clock, and the data shows that this boost is sustained under load, as evidenced by the 161.1 FPS at 1440p Low. The GPU’s 12 GB memory is a notable advantage over older 8 GB cards, as it allows the 4K High preset to operate at 66.6 FPS without falling back to texture streaming issues. The pixel rate of 244.2 GPixel/s and texture rate of 549.5 GTexel/s are sufficient to avoid bottlenecks in this title.

How This Combo Ranks

This specific combination of the Intel Core Ultra 7 265K and AMD Radeon RX 7700 XT ranks 701st out of 1637 tested combos in Lockdown Protocol. That places it in the 57th percentile of all combinations, meaning it outperforms more than half of the tested systems. The rank suggests that while this is not an extreme high-end setup, it is firmly in the upper-middle tier for this game. The CPU is a significant contributor to this ranking, as it sits in the 97th percentile of all CPUs, while the GPU is in the 73rd percentile.

The CPU’s average benchmark score of 79102 is nearly identical to its nearest rival, the Intel Core Ultra 7 265KF, which scores 79240 with a deltaPct of -0.2. This means the 265K is effectively on par with its KF counterpart, and only 0.9% behind the Intel Core i9-14900K. The GPU’s average score of 30097 is likewise almost identical to the RTX 5060’s 30109, with a deltaPct of 0. This symmetry in synthetic benchmarks suggests that the combo’s ranking is determined by how well these two components interact in-game, rather than one being a weak link.

At 701st of 1637, the combo is ahead of the median but not among the top 10%. The FPS data confirms this: 4K Ultra at 50.8 FPS is below the 60 FPS threshold, but 4K Medium at 75.1 FPS is respectable. The rank implies that users with higher-end GPUs, such as those in the 90th percentile, will achieve notably better 4K results, but this combo still delivers a smooth 1440p experience. The data shows that the CPU is not holding the GPU back, as even at 1080p Low (219.4 FPS), the system is producing frame rates that would stress many displays.

Measured FPS Breakdown

At 1080p, the FPS scales almost linearly with preset quality. Low produces 219.4 FPS, Medium drops to 156.1 FPS, High falls to 134 FPS, and Ultra bottoms out at 100.9 FPS. The gap between Low and Medium is 63.3 FPS, while the gap between High and Ultra is 33.1 FPS. This indicates that the transition from Low to Medium adds significant visual fidelity at a 28.8% performance cost, while the jump from High to Ultra is less punishing but still noticeable.

At 1440p, the numbers are 161.1 FPS on Low, 115.1 FPS on Medium, 97.6 FPS on High, and 74.3 FPS on Ultra. The drop from 1080p to 1440p is consistent across presets: Low loses 58.3 FPS, Medium loses 41 FPS, High loses 36.4 FPS, and Ultra loses 26.6 FPS. This pattern shows that higher presets become relatively more efficient at 1440p, as the GPU is less likely to be pixel-bound and more likely to be shader-bound.

At 4K, the results are 103 FPS on Low, 75.1 FPS on Medium, 66.6 FPS on High, and 50.8 FPS on Ultra. The 4K Low result is surprisingly close to the 1080p Ultra result (103 vs 100.9), which suggests that the GPU is capable of handling 4K when the visual load is minimized. The 4K Ultra result of 50.8 FPS is the only row below 60 FPS, making it the only setting not suitable for smooth play. The 4K Medium result of 75.1 FPS is the best balance for 4K displays, offering a 12.8% improvement over High while maintaining visual quality above Low.

Resolution Scaling

The FPS drop from 1080p to 4K is steep but not uniform. At Low settings, the drop is from 219.4 FPS to 103 FPS, a 53.1% reduction. At Medium, it goes from 156.1 FPS to 75.1 FPS, a 51.9% reduction. At High, it falls from 134 FPS to 66.6 FPS, a 50.3% reduction. At Ultra, it drops from 100.9 FPS to 50.8 FPS, a 49.7% reduction. This means that higher presets see slightly smaller percentage drops, indicating that the GPU’s pixel throughput (244.2 GPixel/s) is less of a constraint when shader complexity is higher.

The data suggests that the RX 7700 XT is the limiting component at 4K, as the CPU’s 20 cores and 5.5 GHz boost clock are unlikely to be challenged by a 50.8 FPS workload. Conversely, at 1080p Low (219.4 FPS), the CPU is still not the bottleneck, as the GPU’s 35.17 TFLOPS are sufficient to push that many frames. The scaling from 1440p to 4K is more pronounced than from 1080p to 1440p: at High, the drop is 31 FPS (97.6 to 66.6), while at Medium it is 40 FPS (115.1 to 75.1). This non-linear scaling points to memory bandwidth (432.0 GB/s) becoming a factor at 4K, as the 192-bit bus is a known limitation for high-resolution textures.

The resolution scaling implies that for 4K gaming, users should stick to Medium or Low, while 1440p users can comfortably use High without sacrificing frame rates. The 1080p results show that the system is overkill for that resolution, with even Ultra exceeding 100 FPS. This suggests that Lockdown Protocol is not particularly demanding on the CPU, allowing the GPU to be the sole determinant of performance.

FAQ

Q: What is the best preset for 1440p gaming with this combo?

A: Medium is the best choice, as it delivers 115.1 FPS compared to High’s 97.6 FPS and Ultra’s 74.3 FPS. The 17.5 FPS advantage over High is significant for competitive play.

Q: Can this system handle 4K at 60 FPS?

A: Yes, but only on Medium or lower. Medium produces 75.1 FPS, while High drops to 66.6 FPS. Ultra falls below 60 FPS at 50.8 FPS, so it is not recommended for 4K.

Q: How does the RX 7700 XT compare to its nearest GPU rival?

A: The RX 7700 XT has an average benchmark score of 30097, while the NVIDIA GeForce RTX 5060 scores 30109, a deltaPct of 0. They are effectively tied in synthetic performance, which explains the similar FPS expectations.

Q: Is the CPU or GPU the bottleneck in this game?

A: The GPU is the limiting factor, especially at 4K and Ultra settings. The CPU’s 97th percentile ranking and 20 cores provide more than enough headroom, as evidenced by 219.4 FPS at 1080p Low.

Q: What is the frame rate difference between High and Ultra at 1080p?

A: High produces 134 FPS, while Ultra produces 100.9 FPS, a difference of 33.1 FPS. This is a 24.7% performance cost for Ultra’s visual improvements.

Q: Why does 4K Low (103 FPS) outperform 1080p Ultra (100.9 FPS)?

A: The 4K Low result is slightly higher, which indicates that the Ultra preset’s shader complexity has a greater impact on performance than the resolution increase. This suggests the GPU is more sensitive to settings than resolution.

CPU Role

The Intel Core Ultra 7 265K is a 20-core, 20-thread processor based on the Arrow Lake architecture, built on a 3 nm process. Its base clock is 3.90 GHz with a boost clock of 5.50 GHz, and it has 30 MB of shared L3 cache. In Lockdown Protocol, this CPU is clearly not a bottleneck, as the FPS numbers are consistently high even at 1080p Low. The CPU’s Cinebench R23 multi-core score of 50009 and single-core score of 7060 indicate strong performance, but the game does not appear to stress it.

The CPU’s 97th percentile ranking among all CPUs means it is faster than 97% of processors. Its nearest rival, the Intel Core Ultra 7 265KF, has an average score of 79240 versus the 265K’s 79102, a deltaPct of -0.2. This negligible difference means the 265K and 265KF are interchangeable for gaming. The i9-14900K is only 0.9% faster, so the 265K is effectively on par with Intel’s previous flagship.

In the context of this combo, the CPU’s role is to feed the GPU enough data to maintain high frame rates. At 1440p Medium, the system hits 115.1 FPS, which requires the CPU to handle game logic and draw calls at that rate. The 20 cores, while not all used by a single game, provide headroom for background tasks and future titles. The 5.50 GHz boost clock ensures that single-threaded performance is sufficient for the game’s main thread, while the 30 MB L3 cache reduces memory latency. The CPU’s PassMark single-thread score of 4904 and multi-thread score of 58838 confirm that it is a top-tier processor, but in Lockdown Protocol, the GPU is the star of the show.